Archives for category: Real Education
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »

Laura H. Chapman: When Economic Language Corrupts Educational Practice

By dianeravitch
September 21, 2014 //
71

Many years ago, I first heard the term “semantic infiltration.” It was used to refer to the way that words, when used often enough, can become reality, even when we don’t agree with the “reality.” LauraChapman describes the way that technocratic language has corrupted education by inserting its language into the ways we think about children and learning.

She writes:

An economic concept of growth as a “measurable gain” has migrated into federal policies for education. The policy impulse is to simplify the multifaceted character of education and treat the enterprise of teaching and learning as a business in need of proper management to get results. The desired results are defined by forms of learning that can be measured and with a calculation of the rate of learning within a year and year-to-year, comparable to knowing whether profits are increasing—on a trajectory of growth or not.

This economic concept of growth as a “rate of increase” now overrides the educational meanings of human growth and learning—as a multifaceted, dynamic, and interactive process with daily surprises and influences from many sources.

Federal policies treat the economic meaning of growth as a virtue and as an imperative for accountability. This “accountability imperative” is evident in key definitions within RttT regulations and other grant programs. Federal Register. (2009, November 18). Rules and regulations Department of Education: Final Definitions. 74 (221-34), 559751-52.

“Student achievement means (a) For tested grades and subjects: (1) A student’s score on the State’s assessments under the ESEA; and, as appropriate, (2) other measures of student learning, such as those described in paragraph (b) of this definition, provided they are rigorous and comparable across classrooms. (b) For non-tested grades and subjects: Alternative measures of student learning and performance such as student scores on pre-tests and end-of-course tests; student performance on English language proficiency assessments; and other measures of student achievement that are rigorous and comparable across classrooms.”

“Student growth means the change in student achievement for an individual student between two or more points in time.”

“Rigorous” means “statistically rigorous.” Federal Register. (2009, July, 29). Notices 74(144), 37803-37. Retrieved from the Federal Register Online via GPO Access [wais.access.gpo.gov] [DOCID:fr29jy09-148]

The federal definition of an “effective” teacher requires attention to the rates at which student’s scores increase.

“Effective teacher means a teacher whose students achieve acceptable rates (e.g., at least one grade level in an academic year) of student growth (as defined in this notice).

“Highly effective teacher means a teacher whose students achieve high rates (e.g., one and one-half grade levels in an academic year) of student growth (as defined in this notice.”

If should be obvious that calculations to determine “rates” of growth depend on a data system that matches the test scores of individual students and the “teacher of record” for a given student and test. Gates and USDE have poured millions into getting data systems linked and free of crud that will compromise the metrics for accounting.

These integrity of data in these records serve as “baselines” for estimates of the “value-added” by a teacher to the scores of their students and various sub-groups. VAM produce these estimates. SLOs (student learning objectives) are a proxy for VAM until statewide tests for nontested subjects are developed.

Federal definitions mandate “comparable” ratings of teachers regardless of the grade or subject. Learning a foreign language, or math, or learning in dance must be made to look comparable. The bean counters, and bookeepers, and accountants, and statisticians can’t deal with qualitative differences.

Federal policy makers have sought to “normalize” the idea that economic growth is the same as “student growth’ and just an extension of the longstanding metaphor of teaching as nurture, cultivation, gardening (kindergarten)—a child’s garden.

Today, almost every teacher who uses the phrase “student growth” in connection with evaluation has been infected with the federal definition.

Some value-added experts love this easy conflating of the meanings of growth because it makes the convoluted metrics for VAM and SLOs easier to sell… And the silly oak tree analogy one means of doing so. See. http://www.varc.wceruw.org/tutorials/Oak/index.htm

Categories Real Education

The First Day of School on an Island in Maine

By dianeravitch
September 21, 2014 //
17

A friend who moved to Maine sent me this lovely post about the first day of school at the two-room Ashley Bryan school, where children from two neighboring islands join to form a tiny school. It is an exciting day for everyone, children, parents, and community members. Even Ashley Bryan, Maine artist, was there to greet the children.

“It has become a tradition for parents and townspeople to gather in the schoolyard as students arrive for their first day at the two room Ashley Bryan School. Everyone is there to wish them well, to see who the new students are, and to feel good about our special island school and its community support.

“The crew from Great Cranberry arrives by boat and begins the short walk up from the dock. There are 6 students from Great Cranberry and one teacher and one aide who travel by boat every morning. This morning there were also all of the teachers for Art, Music, Phys. Ed and French. The principal was there too. It made for a solid group of educational energy surrounding the school. The inter island students were all happy to reconnect after a busy summer. All around the school yard parents of students, and other community members want to celebrate what a unique school we have.”

There are 16 students in grades K-8, representing every grade but 7. The pictures evoke a foggy island day.

“Teachers Lauren and Audrey asked people to exuberantly make suggestions of goals for the year and then Ashley Bryan read them out and worried that the students will have to work too hard to learn all of these things! I don’t know if you can zoom in on the list, but the suggestions are things like: Laughter, building, discovery, adventure, wonder, fun, awesomeness, cooperation and friendship.”

The children gathered for a group photograph. Then everyone gathered for a community photograph.

Think of it. Somewhere in our great nation, there are remote communities like this where no one worries about VAM and all the other nonsense now raining down on teachers and children. Arne won’t be closing Ashley Bryan. Nice goals for the year.

Categories Joy, Real Education

Amy Frogge: A Novel Idea for Real Education Reform!

By dianeravitch
September 15, 2014 //
13

Everyone wants to reform education. Everyone went to school, so everyone has ideas.

But Amy Frogge, a member of the Metro Nashville School Board, has a truly novel idea: Let experienced educators lead the way. Think of it. Who knows best what children need? Experienced teachers. Who knows best what’s needed to make schools run more efficiently? The people who have been working in them.

Frogge also has the audacious idea that schools would get better if we relied on time-tested research and evidence.

She writes:

“While we must measure progress, our students need more than tests. They need physical activity and unstructured, supervised play. Recess time in many schools has been eliminated or greatly decreased to make way for more instructional time and test prep. However, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics, recess is a crucial component of healthy development that offers cognitive/academic, social/emotional and physical benefits. Here, research verifies common sense: Physical activity actually improves behavior and boosts academic performance.

“All students should have access to a rich, broad curriculum. For-profit testing companies are impacting not only recess, but also school curriculum. Too often, the arts and enrichment activities are curtailed in an effort to improve standardized test scores, which provide only limited information for educators. Students need exposure to music, art and nature. New research indicates that music can even help close the achievement gap, and school gardens offer excellent opportunities for children to spend time outside while learning hands-on lessons about core subjects, healthy eating and the environment.

“As a community, we must ensure that every child comes to school ready to learn. Research confirms that poverty, not poor teachers, is at the root of sagging school performance. Indeed, the single biggest factor impacting school performance is the socioeconomic status of the student’s family. Nashville has seen a 42 percent increase in poverty in the past 10 years, and our child poverty and hunger rates remain alarmingly high throughout the U.S. Too many of our students lack basic necessities, and many suffer what experts have termed “toxic stress” caused by chronic poverty. Our efforts to address this problem must extend outside of school walls to provide “wrap-around services” that address social, emotional and physical needs of children through community partnerships and volunteers.”

Categories Real Education

Frank Breslin: Dickens and Standardized Testing

By dianeravitch
September 15, 2014 //
9

Frank Breslin, retired high school teacher, considers the current obsession with standardized testing in reading and mathematics and laments the neglect of history, foreign languages, science, and everything else that is not tested.

He writes:

“Reading and math, indeed, must be taught, but much more besides — literature, history, science, world languages, music, art, and, in an age of childhood obesity, physical education. But, thanks to this mandate, they no longer are because they no longer are tested.

“Even the restorative elixir of play and recess so vital to children is often omitted, so frantic are teachers at not having enough time to cover the testable material of reading and math. The result is an alarming narrowing both of curriculum and of children’s minds by this relentless barrage of testing and test preparation.

“But this has also had an overlooked, though no less pernicious, effect on students, not just by the little that is now being taught, but also by the many subjects now being omitted because there is no time to teach them.

“And it is this that is so very chilling about this educational “reform,” which is not about reform at all, but something very ominous — control of the mind.

“How better undermine education than by crippling thought; how better discourage critical inquiry than by stressing rote learning; how better weaken democracy than by subverting its schools!

“Teachers are deeply disturbed by what is now going on in the classroom. Only someone ignorant of what a school is about, who likens the classroom to an assembly line for the making of widgets, could be blind to the intangible dimension of what should be going on between teacher and students, but no longer is — the opening of vistas, introducing new worlds, the inducing of wonder, pushing back the unknown.

“Gone are those wondrous “teachable moments” that all of us recall from our own childhood years when a teacher would transfix us for a few rapturous moments when time stood still, as he or she took us into the very heart of what it means to be human, thrilling lessons that would remain with us for the rest of our lives. Such old-fashioned teaching is a thing of the past….

“Dickens skewered such “education” in his grotesque portrayals of Victorian schools in Hard Times, Nicholas Nickleby, and David Copperfield, where gargoyle schoolmasters like Gradgrind, Squeers, and Creakle are let loose upon children to their irreparable harm.

“The interminable mantra of “facts” heaped upon “facts,” the dogmatic insistence that only what can be measured, quantified, counted, and weighed is real and important, objective and useful, that all else is humbug — this pestiferous doctrine was unmasked for all times as tragically destructive to children. Such was the national fury and outrage at what innocent children were being made to endure in such schools that they were swept away overnight.”

Only those who know nothing of the love of learning could impose so soulless and deadening a regime on the nation’s children. Unfortunately Washington, D.C. and our state legislatures are overrun with people who resemble Mr. Gradgrind.

Categories Education Reform, Real Education, Standardized Testing

Frank Breslin: A Moral Vision of Schooling

By dianeravitch
September 11, 2014 //
24

These days we seem to have forgotten what schools are for. Our national leaders see them only as economic institutions, preparing students for careers and college. Business leaders see them as workplace training.

Frank Breslin, a retired high school teacher of German, Latin, and history, has a vision of schooling that is far broader than training to get a job or get ahead.

This is how he begins:

“A school is a sacred place. It reveres every child as a being of infinite worth and dignity, whatever his or her ability.

“A school is about teaching children the skills they need to prevail in a world that makes it difficult to keep one’s bearings.

“It is about helping them develop belief in themselves and instilling trust in their own judgment to think for themselves.”

Children are not just future workers. They are human beings, each deserving the best education we can provide.

Categories Real Education

Joel Westheimer: We Need More Mr. Keatings!

By dianeravitch
August 26, 2014 //
5

Joel Westheimer is a professor at the University of Ottawa in Canada, where he serves as the University Research Chair in Democracy in Education. He wrote this tribute to Mr. Keating, the fictional teacher in “The Dead Poets’ Society” before Robin Williams’ death.

 

 

He wrote:

 

 

 

 

In a popular scene from the 1989 movie, Dead Poets Society, the eccentric Mr. Keating (played by Robin Williams), asks one of his students to read aloud from the preface of a high school poetry textbook:

 

To fully understand poetry, we must first be fluent with its meter, rhyme and figures of speech, then ask two questions: 1) How artfully has the objective of the poem been rendered and 2) How important is that objective? Question 1 rates the poem’s perfection; question 2 rates its importance. And once these questions have been answered, determining the poem’s greatness becomes a relatively simple matter. If the poem’s score for perfection is plotted on the horizontal of a graph and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the poem yields the measure of its greatness.
The fictional author of the text, Dr. J. Evans Pritchard, PhD, continues with an example: “A sonnet by Byron might score high on the vertical but only average on the horizontal. A Shakespearean sonnet, on the other hand, would score high both horizontally and vertically, yielding a massive total area, thereby revealing the poem to be truly great.” Pritchard concludes by asking students to practice this rating method (using the provided rubric) because “[a]s your ability to evaluate poems in this matter grows, so will your enjoyment and understanding of poetry.”

 

Although both the textbook and its author are fictional, the satire is worrisomely apt. In fact, the fictional passage was based closely on a real text found in a popular 1950s poetry textbook currently in its twelfth edition and still used by high school students across the country: Laurence Perrine’s Sound and Sense: An Introduction to Poetry. In other words, the demand for standardized measures of quality and success in education has not abated but increased

 

The relatively uncritical and universal acceptance among school reformers of the importance of so-called standards, rubrics, and uniform assessment tools for teaching and learning is at once predictable and misguided. It is predictable because the idea that we should clearly articulate educational goals and then devise methods for determining whether those goals are met is irresistibly tidy. After all, how can teachers pursue high quality lessons if they do not know what they are trying to teach and whether students are learning? Uncritical acceptance of even such a common-sense seeming idea, however, is misguided for the following reason: education is first and foremost about human relationship and interaction, and as anyone who tried to create a standardized test for family fealty or for love or for trust would discover, any effort to quantify complex human interactions quickly devolves into a fool’s errand.

 

This does not mean that there is no place for evaluation in education, or for standards, rubrics, and common curriculum frameworks. A new book, Rubric Nation, coming out this Fall edited by Joseph Flynn and Michelle Tenem-Zemach takes a critical stance at the same time many of the contributing authors make the need for thoughtful measures and learning frameworks clear.[i] Moreover, I have rarely met a teacher who did not have standards; most have their own forms of rubrics or evaluative frameworks as well. But “No Child Left Behind” and “Race to the Top” legislation and related reforms that call for ever-more standardized rubrics and frameworks have severely restricted teachers’ abilities to act in a professional capacity and exercise professional judgment on behalf of their students.

 

Finnish educator Pasi Sahlberg calls the kind of school reform that elevates the pursuit of rubrics and standardization above all other educational considerations GERM (for Global Education Reform Movement). He describes GERM as follows:

 

It is like an epidemic that spreads and infects education systems through a virus. It travels with pundits, media and politicians. Education systems borrow policies from others and get infected. As a consequence, schools get ill, teachers don’t feel well, and kids learn less.[ii]
Not only do kids learn less. What they learn also tends to follow prescriptive formulas that match the standardized tests. In the process, more complex and difficult-to-measure learning outcomes get left behind. These include creativity and emotional and social development as well as the kinds of thinking skills associated with robust civic engagement. As a result, teachers’ ability to teach critical thinking and students’ ability to think and act critically is diminished.

 

Almost every school mission statement these days boasts broad goals related to critical thinking, global citizenship, environmental stewardship, and moral character. Yet beneath the rhetoric, increasingly narrow curriculum goals, accountability measures, standardized testing and an obsession with rubrics have reduced too many classroom lessons to the cold, stark pursuit of information and skills without context and without social meaning – what the late education philosopher Maxine Greene called mean and repellent facts. It is not that facts are bad or that they should be ignored. But democratic societies require more than citizens who are fact-full. They require citizens who can think and act in ethically thoughtful ways. Schools need the kinds of classroom practices that teach students to recognize ambiguity and conflict in “factual” content and to see human conditions and aspirations as complex and contested.

 

As our cultural obsession with standardization, rubrics, and accountability measures in only two subject areas (math and literacy) increasingly dominates school reform, the most common complaint I now hear from both teachers and administrators is this: I have been stripped of my professional judgment, creativity, and freedom to make decisions in the best interests of my students. When education reforms turn away from an emphasis on supporting positive conditions of practice and move towards technocratic strategies for “compliance,” the profession suffers and so do students. Many teachers would echo the sentiments of Gloria, a teacher in a recent study I conducted of the 10th grade civics curriculum in Ontario. She told us this:

 

In my 22 years of teaching, never have I experienced a climate that has turned all educational problems into problems of measurement until now. Poor citizenship skills? Raise their math and literacy scores. Poor participation? Doesn’t matter. Poverty? Inequality? The solution is always always to give the students more tests. These days pedagogically, I feel like I can’t breathe.
But education goals, particularly in democratic societies, have always been about more than narrow measures of success, and teachers have often been called upon and appreciated for instilling in their students a sense of purpose, meaning, community, compassion, integrity, imagination, and commitment. Every teacher accomplishes these more artful and ambiguous tasks in different ways.

 

Much as Darwin’s theory of natural selection depends on genetic variation, any theory of teaching in a democratic society depends on a multiplicity of ideas, perspectives, and approaches to exploring and seeking solutions to complex issues of widespread concern. Parents, administrators, and politicians alike all must acknowledge that educators in a democratic society have a responsibility to create learning environments that teach students a broad variety of lessons – including but not limited to the kinds of learning goals easily captured by standardized assessments.

 

Talented teachers need the freedom and professional autonomy to work the magic of their art in a myriad of different ways that defy standardization and regimentation of practice. Talented teachers need manageable class sizes in which they can provide the right conditions for that magic to take root. And talented teachers need policymakers who have the courage to marshal the resources necessary to create the best possible conditions of practice and then let teachers do their jobs free of interference and corrosive mistrust.

 

Nothing about the kinds of standards that school reformers are pursuing with such certainty is black and white. That’s why scholars of education must work together to create a space for dialogue around the tensions inherent in the teaching profession between autonomy and committee-rule, between spontaneity and uniformity. Far from allowing the poetry of teaching and learning to be reduced to facile measurements, educators must demand a fuller framing of assessment and educational progress.

 

You may recall in Dead Poets Society that after allowing his students to listen attentively to the detailed instructions on measuring the quality of poetry (even drawing a graph on the blackboard to show just how to execute the formula for evaluation), Keating proceeds to demand that students rip out that entire chapter from the text. “Be gone J. Evans Pritchard, PhD!” he exclaims to the sound of students tearing out the offending pages. He was asking them, of course, to revel in the radical possibility of unquantifiable teaching and learning. In honor of Mr. Williams’ irreverent humor and his complex portrayal of Mr. Keating, I hope every teacher enters the new school year with just such an attitude.

 

 

[i] J. Flynn & M. Tenam-Zemach (Eds.), Rubric Nation: A reader on the utility and impact of rubrics in education. Charlotte, North Carolina: Information Age Publishing.

 

[ii] Sahlberg, P. (2012, June 29). How GERM is infecting schools around the world. The Washington Post. [The Answer Sheet web log by Valerie Strauss]. Retrieved http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/how-germ-is-infecting-schools-around-the-world/2012/06/29/gJQAVELZAW_blog.html.

Categories Data and Data Mining, Real Education, Resistance

Vermont to the Nation: This Is What Good Education Looks Like

By dianeravitch
August 24, 2014 //
31

The Vermont State Board of Education adopted a resolution on assessment and accountability with a message: We will not let the federal government bully our children. We read research and incorporate it into our policy decisions. This set of principles and resolutions could serve as a guide for every state and school district about the appropriate uses of assessment and the true goals of education in our society.

Vermont State Board of Education

Statement and Resolution on Assessment and Accountability Adopted August 19, 2014

The Vermont State Board of Education is committed to ensuring that all students develop the knowledge, capabilities and dispositions they need to thrive as citizens in their communities, higher education and their careers in the 21st century. The Board of Education’s Education Quality Standards (EQS) rules aim to ensure that all students in Vermont public schools are afforded educational opportunities that are substantially equal in quality, and enable them to achieve or exceed the standards approved by the State Board of Education.

These rules were designed to ensure continuous improvement in student performance, instruction and leadership, so that all students are able to develop high levels of skill and capability across seven essential domains: literacy, mathematics, scientific inquiry and knowledge, global citizenship, physical and health education and wellness, artistic expression, and transferable 21st century skills.

To achieve these goals, educators need to make use of diverse indicators of student learning and strengths, in order to comprehensively assess student progress and adjust their practice to continuously improve learning. They also need to document the opportunities schools provide to further the goals of equity and growth.

Uniform standardized tests, administered across all schools, are a critical tool for schools’ improvement efforts. Without some stable and valid external measure, we cannot evaluate how effective we are in our efforts to improve schools and learning. Standardized tests – along with teacher-developed assessments and student work samples — can give educators and citizens insight into the skills, knowledge and capabilities our students have developed.

What standardized tests can do that teacher developed tests cannot do is give us reliable, comparative data. We can use test scores to tell whether we are doing better over time. Of particular note, standardized tests help monitor how well we serve students with different life circumstances and challenges. When used appropriately, standardized tests are a sound and objective way to evaluate student progress.

Despite their value, there are many things tests cannot tell us. Standardized tests like the NECAP and soon, the SBAC, can tell us something about how students are doing in a limited set of narrowly defined subjects overall, as measured at a given time. However, they cannot tell us how to help students do even better. Nor can they adequately capture the strengths of all children, nor the growth that can be ascribed to individual teachers. And under high-stakes conditions, when schools feel extraordinary pressure to raise scores, even rising scores may not be a signal that students are actually learning more. At best, a standardized test is an incomplete picture of learning: without additional measures, a single test is inadequate to capture a years’ worth of learning and growth.

Along a related dimension, the American Psychological Association wrote:

“(N)o test is valid for all purposes. Indeed, tests vary in their intended uses and in their ability to provide meaningful assessments of student learning. Therefore, while the goal of using large-scale testing to measure and improve student and school system performance is laudable, it is also critical that such tests are sound, are scored properly, and are used appropriately.”

Unfortunately, the way in which standardized tests have been used under federal law as almost the single measure of school quality has resulted in the frequent misuse of these instruments across the nation.

Because of the risk of inappropriate uses of testing, the Vermont State Board of Education herewith adopts a series of guiding principles for the appropriate use of standardized tests to support continuous improvements of learning.

1. The Proper Role of Standardized Testing – The purpose of any large scale assessment must be clearly stated and the assessments must be demonstrated as scientifically and empirically valid for that purpose(s) prior to their use. This includes research and verification as to whether a student’s performance on tests is actually predictive of performance on other indicators we care about, including post-secondary success, graduation rates and future employment.

In addition, standardized test results should be used only in concert with a diverse set of measures that capture evidence of student growth and school impact across all important outcomes outlined in the Education Quality Standards.

2. Public Reporting Requirement – It is a state and local obligation to report on the quality of the schools to the citizenry. Standardized testing is part of this reporting obligation. The state board encourages local public reporting of a diverse and comprehensive set of school quality indicators in local school, faculty and community communications.

3. Judicious and Proportionate Testing – The State Board of Education advocates for reducing the amount of time spent on summative, standardized testing and encourages the federal government to reduce the current requirements for annual testing in multiple subjects in every grade, 3-8, and then again in high school. Excessive testing diverts resources and time away from learning while providing little additional value for accountability purposes.

4. Test Development Criteria – Any broad scale standardized assessment used in the state of Vermont must be developed and used appropriately in accord with the principles adopted by the American Educational Research Association, the National Council on Measurement in Education, and the American Psychological Association.

5. Value-added scores – Although the federal government is encouraging states to use value added scores for teacher, principal and school evaluations, this policy direction is not appropriate. A strong body of recent research has found that there is no valid method of calculating “value-added” scores which compare pass rates from one year to the next, nor do current value-added models adequately account for factors outside the school that influence student performance scores. Thus, other than for research or experimental purposes, this technique will not be employed in Vermont schools for any consequential purpose.

6. Mastery level or Cut-Off scores – While the federal government continues to require the use of subjectively determined, cut-off scores; employing such metrics lacks scientific foundation. The skills needed for success in society are rich and diverse. Consequently, there is no single point on a testing scale that has proven accurate in measuring the success of a school or in measuring the talents of an individual. Claims to the contrary are technically indefensible and their application would be unethical.
The use of cut-off scores reports findings only at one point on a statistical distribution. Scale scores provide significantly more information. They allow a more valid disaggregation of scores by sub-group, provide better measures of progress and provide a more comprehensive view of achievement gaps.

7. Use of cut scores and proficiency categories for reporting purposes – Under NCLB states are required to report school level test results in terms of the Percentage of Proficient Students. The federally mandated reporting method has several well-documented negative effects that compromise our ability to meaningfully examine schools’ improvement efforts:

 Interpretations based on “percent proficient” hides the full range of scores and how they have changed. Thus, underlying trends in performance are often hidden.

 The targets established for proficiency are subjectively determined and are not based on research. Interpretations based on “percent proficient” also lack predictive validity.

 Modest changes to these subjective cut scores can dramatically affect the percent of students who meet the target. Whether a cut score is set high or low arbitrarily changes the size of the achievement gap independent of the students’ learning. Thus, the results can be misleading.

So that we can more validly and meaningfully describe school- and state-level progress, the State Board of Education endorses reporting performance in terms of scale scores and standard deviations rather than percent proficient. We will comply with federal requirements, but will emphasize defensible and useful reporting metrics.

8. The Federal, State and Local Obligation for Assuring Adequacy and Equality of Opportunity – Much as the state must insure a high quality education for all children, the school must be provided with adequate and equitable resources from the federal, state and local governments and must use these resources wisely and judiciously. Thus, any report on a school based on the state’s EQS standards must also include a report on the adequacy of resources provided by or to that school in light of the school’s unique needs. Such evaluations shall address the adequacy of resources, the judicious use of resources and identify any deficiencies.

Resolution on Assessment and Accountability Vermont State Board of Education

WHEREAS, our nation and Vermont’s future well-being relies on a high-quality public education system that prepares all students for college, careers, citizenship and lifelong learning, and strengthens the nation’s and the state’s social and economic well-being; and

WHEREAS, our nation’s school systems have been spending growing amounts of time, money and energy on high-stakes standardized testing, in which student performance on standardized tests is used to make major decisions affecting individual students, educators and schools; and

WHEREAS, the overreliance on high-stakes standardized testing in state and federal accountability systems is undermining educational quality and equity in the nation’s public schools by hampering educators’ efforts to focus on the broad range of learning experiences that promote the innovation, creativity, problem solving, collaboration, communication, critical thinking and deep subject-matter knowledge that will allow students to thrive in a democracy and an increasingly global society and economy; and

WHEREAS, it is widely recognized that standardized testing is an inadequate and often unreliable measure of both student learning and educator effectiveness; and

WHEREAS, a compelling body of national research shows the over-emphasis on standardized testing has caused considerable collateral damage in areas such as narrowing the curriculum, teaching to the test, reducing love of learning, pushing students out of school, and undermining school climate; and

WHEREAS, high-stakes standardized testing has negative effects for students from all backgrounds, and especially for low-income students, English language learners, children of color, and those with disabilities; and

WHEREAS, the culture and structure of the systems in which students learn must change in order to foster engaging school experiences that promote joy in learning, depth of thought and breadth of knowledge for students; therefore be it

RESOLVED that the Vermont State Board of Education requests that the Secretary of Education reexamine public school accountability systems in this state, and develop a system based on multiple forms of assessment which has at its center qualitative assessments, does not require extensive standardized testing, more accurately reflects the broad range of student learning, decreases the role of compliance monitoring, and is used to support students and improve schools; and

RESOLVED, that the Vermont State Board of Education calls on the United States Congress and Administration to accordingly amend the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (currently known as the “No Child Left Behind Act”) to reduce the testing mandates, promote multiple forms of evidence of student learning and school quality, eschew the use of student test scores in evaluating educators, and allow flexibility that reflects the unique circumstances of all states; and

RESOLVED that the Vermont State Board of Education calls on other state and national organizations to act in concert with these goals to improve and broaden educational goals, provide adequate resources, and ensure a high quality education for all children of the state and the nation.

Categories Accountability, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Real Education, Support for public schools, Teacher Evaluations, Testing, Vermont

Edward Berger on the Tenets of Education in a Democracy

By dianeravitch
August 17, 2014 //
23

I posted a blog by Edward F. Berger a few days ago, and as is my occasional failing, neglected to add the link. He said much that was wise and ended on a thoughtful and provocative note, which bears repeating. As you can readily tell from his writing and thinking, Ed is a veteran educator.

These are the tried-and-true tenets of education in a democratic society:

• We do not experiment on children.
• We honor and get to know each child, even those who are hurt and will not score well on summative tests. Unless the system is overloaded – not enough resources and too many children assigned to a teacher – no child is left behind.
• We honor a long history of One Nation united by our education system through common values, comprehensive curriculum, one overall language, and free K-12 education for every child.
• We reject the false assumption that schools can be run for profit. Profits take money away from children/schools. These are dollars that must go to services for children.
• School governance must follow democratic principles, starting with elected officials and elected school boards, and not mayoral control, politically appointed czars, or would-be oligarchs from the Billionaire Boys Club (think Eli Broad).
• We have a proven system of certification and competence. Educators are constantly evaluated by parents, administrators, peers, and students. This is the reason there are very few “bad” teachers.

As an amendment, I don’t think that Berger is saying that bilingual or dual language programs are not part of our tradition (they are), but that every citizen should eventually be able to function in English.

Categories Real Education

Long Island Educators Invite You to Dream About Better Education

By dianeravitch
August 12, 2014 //
1

Join educators and community leaders for an important one day Summer Institute to provide an alternate pathway to the test based accountability system. On August 21st, leaders will convene at Dowling College from 8:30am- 3:00 pm to explore the work of Michael Fullan and Andy Hargreaves (Professional Capital) as they work collaboratively to build the social capital needed to confront the de-professionalization of teaching.

For more information please contact David Gamberg at: dgamberg@southoldufsd.com, or go to the following website for details:

http://www.schoolleadership20.com/events/developing-an-alternative-path-for-school-improvement-summer-inst

Categories New York, Real Education

Rebecca Holcombe, a Hero of American Education

By dianeravitch
August 7, 2014 //
31

This is a good news story about a state commissioner of education who stood up and said, with quiet determination, that the emperor has no clothes.

That state commissioner is Rebecca Holcombe of Vermont. She wrote a clear and eloquent letter to the parents and caregivers of Vermont, explaining the punitive and incoherent nature of federal education policy, which (under NCLB) requires that every single school in Vermont be labeled low-performing, even though many national and international measures show that Vermont is a high-performing state. She explained that Vermont refused to apply for a waiver from NCLB offered by Secretary Duncan because it would have forced the state to evaluate teachers by their students’ test scores, which is unreliable and unfair to teachers and students.

Commissioner Holcombe wrote that Vermont believes that schools have purposes that are no less important (and perhaps more important) than test scores.

For her thoughtfulness, her integrity, her devotion to children, her understanding of the broad aims of education, and her courage in standing firm against ruinous federal policies, Rebecca Holcombe is a hero of American education. Most people go along with the crowd, even when doing so violates their sense of personal and professional ethics. Not Commissioner Holcombe. If our nation had more state commissioners like her, it would save our children from a mindless culture of test and punish that the federal department of education has imposed on them and our nation’s schools.

This is the letter that State Commissioner Holcombe wrote to every parent and caregiver in Vermont:

“Under the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), as of 2014, if only one child in your school does not score as “proficient” on state tests, then your school must be “identified” as “low performing” under federal law. This year, every school whose students took the NECAP tests last year is now considered a “low performing” school by the US Department of Education. A small group of schools were not affected by this policy this year because they helped pilot the new state assessment and so did not take the NECAPs last year. Because these schools had their federal AYP status frozen at 2013 levels, eight schools are not yet identified as low performing by federal criteria. However, had these school taken the NECAPs as well, it is likely that every single school in the state would have to be classified as “low performing” according to federal guidelines.

“The Vermont Agency of Education does not agree with this federal policy, nor do we agree that all of our schools are low performing.

In 2013, the federal Education Department released a study comparing the performance of US states to the 47 countries that participated in the most recent Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study, one of the two large international comparative assessments. Vermont ranked 7th in the world in eighth-grade mathematics and 4th in science. Only Massachusetts, which has a comparable child poverty rate, did better.

“On the National Assessment of Educational Progress, Vermont consistently ranks at the highest levels. We have the best graduation rate in the nation and are ranked second in child well-being.

“Just this week, a social media company that compares financial products (WalletHub) analyzed twelve different quality metrics and ranked Vermont’s school system third in the nation in terms school performance and outcomes.

“Nevertheless, if we fail to announce that each Vermont school is “low performing,” we jeopardize federal funding for elementary and secondary education. The “low performing” label brings with it a number of mandatory sanctions, which your principal is required to explain to you. This policy does not serve the interest of Vermont schools, nor does it advance our economic or social well-being. Further, it takes our focus away from other measures that give us more meaningful and useful data on school effectiveness.

“It is not realistic to expect every single tested child in every school to score as proficient. Some of our students are very capable, but may have unique learning needs that make it difficult for them to accurately demonstrate their strengths on a standardized test. Some of our children survived traumatic events that preclude good performance on the test when it is administered. Some of our students recently arrived from other countries, and have many valuable talents but may not yet have a good grasp of the academic English used on our assessments. And, some of our students are just kids who for whatever reason are not interested in demonstrating their best work on a standardized test on a given day.

“We know that statewide, our biggest challenge is finding better ways to engage and support the learning of children living in poverty. Our students from families with means and parents with more education, consistently are among the top performing in the country. However, federal NCLB policy has not helped our schools improve learning or narrow the gaps we see in our data between children living in poverty and children from more affluent families. We need a different approach that actually works.”

What are the alternatives? Most other states have received a waiver to get out from under the broken NCLB policy. They did this by agreeing to evaluate their teachers and principals based on the standardized test scores of their students. Vermont is one of only 5 states that do not have a waiver at this time. We chose not to agree to a waiver for a lot of reasons, including that the research we have read on evaluating teachers based on test scores suggests these methods are unreliable in classes with 15 or fewer students, and this represents about 40-50% of our classes. It would be unfair to our students to automatically fire their educators based on technically inadequate tools. Also, there is evidence suggesting that over-relying on test-based evaluation might fail to credit educators for doing things we actually want them to do, such as teach a rich curriculum across all important subject areas, and not just math and English language arts. In fact, nation-wide, we expect more and more states to give up these waivers for many of the reasons we chose not to pursue one in the first place.

Like other Vermont educators, I am deeply committed to continuously improving our schools and the professional skill of our teachers. I have heard from principals and teachers across the state who are deeply committed to developing better ways of teaching and working with parents and other organizations to ensure that every child’s basic needs are met. If basic needs are not met, children cannot take advantage of opportunities that we provide in school. However, the federal law narrows our vision of schools and what we should be about. Ironically, the only way a school could pass the NCLB criteria would be to leave some children behind – to exclude some of the students who come to our doors. That is something public schools in Vermont will not do.

Matching Our Measures to Our Purpose

Certainly, we know tests are an important part of our tool kit, but they do not capture everything that is important for our children to learn. With this in mind, our State Board of Education clearly outlined five additional education priorities in our new Education Quality Standards, including scientific inquiry, citizenship, physical health and wellness, artistic expression and 21st century transferable skills.

As parents and caregivers, we embrace a broader vision for our children than that defined in federal policy. Thus, we encourage you to look at your own child’s individual growth and learning, along with evidence your school has provided related to your child’s progress. Below are some questions to consider:

• What evidence does your school provide of your child’s growing proficiency?

• Is your child developing the skills and understanding she needs to thrive in school and
the community?

• Are graduates of your school system prepared to succeed in college and/or careers?

• Is your child happy to go to school and engaged in learning?

• Can your child explain what he is learning and why? Can your child give examples of
skills he has mastered?

• Is your child developing good work habits? Does she understand that practice leads to
better performance?

• Does your child feel his work in school is related to his college and career goals?

• Does your child have one adult at the school whom she trusts and who is committed to
her success?

• If you have concerns, have you reached out to your child’s teacher to share your
perspective?

Be engaged with your school, look at evidence of your own child’s learning, and work with your local educators to ensure that every child is challenged and supported, learning and thriving. Schools prosper when parents are involved as the first teachers of their children.

The State’s Obligation to Our Children

Working with the Governor, the State Board, the General Assembly and other agencies, and most importantly, with educators across the state, the Agency of Education will invite schools across the state to come together to innovate and improve our schools. We hope your school will volunteer to help develop and use a variety of other measures that will give parents, citizens and educators better information on student learning and what we can do to personalize and make it better. These measures include:

• collaborative school visits by teams of peers, to support research, professional learning and sharing of innovative ideas,

• personalization of learning through projects and performance assessments of proficiency,

• gathering and sharing of feedback from teachers, parents and students related to school climate and culture, student engagement and opportunities for self-directed learning,

• providing teachers and administrators standards-based feedback on the effectiveness of their instruction,

• developing personalized learning plans that involve students in defining how they will demonstrate they are ready to graduate, and basing graduation on these personalized assessments of proficiency rather than “seat-time”,

• analyzing growth and improvement at the Supervisory level as well as the school level, to identify systems that seem to be fostering greater growth in students, as a way of identifying and sharing promising practices across schools.

Vermont has a proud and distinguished educational history, but we know we can always do better. We are committed to supporting our schools as they find more effective and more engaging ways to improve the skills and knowledge of our children. As we have done before, we intend to draw on the tremendous professional capability of teachers across the state as we work to continuously improve our schools. Our strength has always been our ingenuity and persistence. In spite of federal policies that poorly fit the unique nature of Vermont, let’s continue to work together to build great schools that prepare our children to be productive citizens and contributors to our society

Categories Federal Waiver, Honor Roll, NCLB (No Child Left Behind), Real Education, Teacher Evaluations, Testing
« Older Entries
Newer Entries »